Perfectly formed twin fillies
were born on the
2nd June 2008 to the Graded Trakehner Show
jumping mare
Sequin II.
This type of birth is an extremely rare event.

The birth came as a complete
surprise to the stud as when the mare was scanned after insemination
there was no sign of multi foetus . Had it shown two , then like
most horse breeders the stud's veterinarian would have been asked
to abort one of them.

The 17 hh broodmare is a daughter
of the prolific Olympic show jumping stallion Abdullah and was purchased
by the Greenacres Stud from the late Ingrid Christodolou . Sequin II was
inseminated by Artificial Insemination to the young talented
Zangersheide show jumping stallion Calvados Z .

Greenacres Stud are no strangers
to the show jumping community with their current team of seven graded
mares being competed by riders Jo Hassall and Alex Thompson and with
their breeding operation based in South Derbyshire.

Proprietor Christine Mart
commented , " It should have been a routine evening in front of the
foaling cameras and I was not fully prepared for the events that
followed "

The first filly foal was
routinely born at 7.30 pm. The 13 year old mare had given birth to
off spring in the past and everything appeared perfectly normal at first
. However , after the birth , Christine noticed that the mother
appeared to have a problem , mainly she feared that the birth had caused
some damage to the mare's uterus.

As a precaution , Christine
immediately called for help from her vet who luckily happened to be just
10 minutes away and it was during this slight wait that the mare started
to push again. " I just couldn't believe it as the hooves of the second
foal started to appear ". Fortunately , one of the Greenacres
staff had just arrived and quickly cleared the immediate delivery
area for the next birth.

The second filly arrived at 7.45
pm but was delivered not breathing . It took a heart stopping 30 seconds
of massaging to get life into the new born. The visiting vets could not
have arrived more on cue even if everything had been rehearsed as they
immediately drew colostrum(s) from the mare and delivered it via stomach
tubes to the youngsters.

A little surprisingly , the
second ( and smaller foal ) to be born was actually on her feet
first but then the long night really began in earnest . After
three hours of this foal trying to suckle without success a two hour
round trip by Christine and her Yard manager Ella Taylor to collect
enough milk for bottle feeding began. Fortunately and much
to the relief of all concerned the foal started to suckle off the mother
at around 2 am ( approx 6 hours after the birth ) , literally just
moments before the milk for the bottle arrived !

Routine checks by the vet later
in the morning confirmed that all organs were functioning normally with
both foals and that the blood counts confirmed that ample anti - bodies
were present in each animal . Equally important and against all the
normal expectations in these circumstances , the foals were perfectly
formed .

To help the foals to grow ,
Greenacres are feeding the broodmare " all the hay she wants ."
She is also eating a feed that is high in protein and vitamins to pass
on as much nutrition as possible to the foals , which have to
split the five gallons of milk their mother produces each day.

" Obviously , we will be keeping
a very close eye over the days ahead " said Christine "but as the
mare actually went over her due delivery date by five days , I am very
optimistic about the future of the two youngsters. Hopefully if all goes
well I will be taking them to the Trakehners UK grading show later in
the year "

Christine also jokingly added
" Apparently this is a rare event and research shows just a 1 in
10,000 chance of this happening with yet even greater odds of such twins
being born perfectly formed as these two young ladies are . Its a bit of
a pity that I am not so lucky with my lottery numbers "